Parents’ Interview (WJHL)
- Questions not provided in video, paragraphs signify jumps/cuts
CBW: “I know she didn’t walk away from this property by herself or off this yard by her swing. I feel in my heart that somebody has came up here and took her. Has lured her away from here.” (0:10)
CBW: “Me and my mother and her were planting flowers and we went in after we got done washing our hands and she got a piece of candy from Grandma and she wanted to go back over and see her brothers and I said okay and I walked her all the way over to the porch and I watched her walk into the kitchen where the boys were watching tv. And I told the boys, I said watch Summer, I’ll be back. And within two minutes I came and I asked the boys where their sister was and they said she went downstairs Mom to play with her toys in the playroom. I said okay, and I yelled downstairs for her a couple times and I didn’t get no answer which was unusual because usually she always answers me.” (1:00)
CBW: “And so I went down there to check and she was nowhere in sight. She was just gone.” (1:17)
CBW: “I don’t go on walks around here or runs because I’m scared of the bears and snakes, and even the coyotes that are around here.” (1:27)
CBW: “Well, whoever has my daughter, I pray and hope that they have not harmed her and they bring her back to us safe and sound.” (1:34)
DW: “Just turned, I mean, go to the FBI, the police and cleared it up, and I don’t know, it seems kind of elusive.”
CW: “It’s really strange that I’ve never seen this truck and I’ve never heard of it until just recently, but I wish they would come forward and explain theirselves and if you’re not a suspect at least come forward and say what you’ve seen.” (2:04)
CW: “She was a tomboy. I shaved my head, she wanted to have her head shaved like me and the boys did.”
DW: “She tried to shave her head in the back…”
CBW: “She tried to shave her head herself.”
DW: “And make it, uh, I think you can see it in some of the pictures. And it was getting out of control so she, we decided to shave her head off and let it grow back long and she shaved her head to, so she wouldn’t feel bad and, uh, but, but it didn’t bother her at this point.” (2:37)
DW: “Well we knew, I knew right away that she was abducted, you know. I knew that right away. That’s what I told them from the beginning but they have to, they have to go through their, you know, I forget the word.”
CBW: “Investigation.”
DW: “They have to do one step at a time I guess but I’m sorry that they had to spend so many man hours in these woods and everything. I’ve seen them limping and everything else, you know and I feel for them. I just wish that there was a way that neighbors could search neighbors’ houses and then if they’re not willing, you know, get a search warrant or something but there’s just no way you can search every single house you know and in the Eastern United States, or whatever, but I wish there was a way. Just thankful for the person or persons that’s doing that, you know, out of love, trying to get information and trying to get her found and we thank them from the bottom of our hearts.”
CBW: “It means a lot.”
DW: “And we thank, uh, everybody who’s trying so hard and praying so hard and she’s, uh, awesome young lady, and uh, we just want her back.” (3:50)
DW: “Yeah there’s always going to be haters you know and you know it’s always going to be that way in this world and we just want to focus on the good friends and Christian people that are trying to help us and praying for us and praying for Summer and, uh, we thank them from the bottom of our hearts and that’s the kind of people we try to relate with and socialize with. So we don’t know anything about you know, no red truck or we hardly know many of our neighbors, I mean, because we just try to be around good people. I mean, and we do have good people in this area we found out since this has all happened. We have some real good neighbors and good folks everywhere but, uh…” (4:39)
CBW: “The most important thing is to bring Summer home. Safe.” (4:46)
CBW: “I’m sorry that you feel this way about us but we love our children with everything we have. We’ve never went without, thanks to Summer’s daddy and my husband. He’s always provided for and has worked as much as he could, and can, and still is. And I’m sorry that you guys feel that way but that’s my baby and nobody would ever treat her like that as long as I was around. Ever. (5:25)
DW: “She loves to, she loves to dance, she loves, she would always want me. She says Daddy hold my hand when she would just, she would like to twirl and twirl and twirl until my arm got tired you know, but, and I mean all I put out there that one of Can, uh, one of Summer’s favorite songs was, uh, Godzilla and they say, you know, they’re jumping all over me about past tense. Was, you know, well, I’m sorry about that but…” (5:58)
CBW: “She also liked the song by New Breed. It was called House, My House. She sung that a lot of times when I play it on the tv. She loved to dance.” (6:09)
DW: “She liked to think of herself as a princess and, uh, you know and all that like all young girls do, and uh… (6:17)
CBW: “She loved Frozen, she loved to be that Elsa and…” (6:28)
DW: “I think she really loved to be in church because she felt a lot of love there and I think you can’t explain what that love is but you feel it, and you know it, you know when you’re young and she felt that there and she loved everybody in that church, or she loves everybody in that church, I should rephrase that because they’ll tear that apart as past tense and I apologize again for that. I hope she gets to come home, you know, and I hope she gets to be with our church family again.” (6:56)
CBW: “Our best friend in that church was R. She loved her to death.” (7:00)
DW: “Yeah, she looked up to women that were…”
CBW: “When she come to that church, she went looking for R, that was her favorite person.” (7:10)
DW: “Any woman that, uh, was professional…”
CBW: “Was pretty, beautiful.”
DW: “Yeah, she looked up to those kind of women, she, you know, they were, uh, how do the word I’m looking for, I can’t think of it but she looked up to them. She’d give them a run for their money every day. She’d give them a run for their money. And there was times, you know, we’d be, you know, that our boys like don’t do this and don’t do that and next thing you know, the stick would come up and just whop them, you know. I’d be like Summer don’t do that.” (7:40)
CBW: “Summer was the boss of the family.” (7:42)
DW: “Yeah she’s typical girl.”
CBW: “They get outta line, she’d put them in line.” (7:48)
DW: “She’d do her best.” (7:50)
CBW: “She’d love to play in the mud and the water and swing on her swing and enjoy dirt.” (7:57)
DW: “When I was, when I run the lawnmower around, she was she would run behind me. When the boys run their bikes around, she as fast as that little bike could go, she would be behind them running as fast and keeping up with them no problem, you know. She loved to run. She just loved to run. And uh, she could pull herself up on that swing her full body weight with her two hands and she could do that and none of the other boys can do that but she can.” (8:25)
QUESTION: “Was she at school yet?”
CBW: “No.”
DW: “No, she was going this year.”
CBW: “This was supposed to be her first year of kindergarten.” (8:30)
DW: “We did all the, what.”
CBW: “I took care of everything, she had her, I had already took all of her shots and registered in the school for ready for this year.” (8:45)
DW: “I just never expected for anyone to get ahold of my heart like she has because I try to guard my heart as much as I can but she just, she holds my heart in her little hands and I love her with all my heart. I mean, I’d do anything to have her back.” (9:07)
DW: “If there’s any way you could find it in your heart to please release her somehow, I don’t know how you might do that, I mean because you’re probably scared of going to prison for the rest of your life and everything else I’m sure but please find it in your heart, have mercy and find a way of letting her go and where we can get her back and uh, just please have mercy on her and, you know, and us, and her brothers. And she’s such a loving, good spirit, please, please don’t hurt her. Please just let her come home. (9:50)
DW: “But my biggest fear is, you know, her being tormented or locked in a dungeon or basement or something because she loves, she loved to be outside all the time. That was her, unfortunately her downfall because a lot of times the boys would be inside and we’d be where’s Summer, why’d you leave her out there alone, you know, go get Summer now, you know? And that’s happened over and over again and, uh, we’d come out and she would always be close by but we was always coming, she had to be outside. She was an outdoor person.” (10:30)
CBW: “She loves to be outside.”
DW: “I’m just so afraid that she’s locked away. She’s such a loving heart and everything and I’m afraid that she won’t be able to, um, locked away where she can’t be outside or with a puppy or anything, you know. Love nature, you know, and it’s, that’s my greatest fear that she’s not able to do any of these things anymore or that she could possibly, you know, I, I don’t want to think she’s dead but it’s a possibility.” (11:08)
DW: “I don’t want to address all the negativity, I just want to focus on the positive because…”
CBW: “Find our daughter.” (11:15)
DW: “It’s so easy to get, you know, lost in that negativity and stuff and it’s just not worth it. So I’m just, uh, I appreciate y’all for the good things you say and, uh, your prayers, that’s awesome.” (11:28)
CBW: “When my sister went missing I was in between Arkansas and Tennessee. I don’t know all of what happened, or what did happen, but I hope that they find her too. And bring her home safely too.” (11:44)
DW: “Yeah, there’s no, there’s nothing that I mean, she disappeared without a trace. They haven’t found anything, haven’t found a body, nothing and you know when you see cases like that, that’s why I lose hope on Summer, you know. I want to keep hope but sometimes I just, I just, I lose hope. And I think well, maybe we won’t never see her again. So I start thinking in past tense, sorry. But I’m trying to keep hope up. I’m trying to keep my prayers up and all that.” (12:15)